Dana White: ‘Daniel Cormier finally gets the respect he deserves’

After win at UFC 226 and becoming the two-division champion, Cormier finally gets the recognition as “one of the best of all time.”

“I think that what this does is, (it) finally gives him the respect that he deserves,” White said at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.

“Jon Jones is, in my opinion, if not the, one of the greatest of all time – could be the,” White said. “The potential that Jon Jones had, who knows what he could have done at heavyweight and everything else. So (Cormier’s) got the shadow of Jon Jones.”

“He’s such a unique guy in every way, shape and form,” White said. “He’s so articulate. He’s a really smart guy. I love the way, when he’s commentating, how he can break down a fight and explain it to you. It’s almost like (Joe) Rogan. He’s so good. He’s great at interviewing people. Then you talk about him as a fighter, right? He definitely doesn’t look like a fighter. Looks out of shape, looks heavy. When you think about him going in there now with a heavyweight, if you notice in the beginning of the fight, every shot he landed on Stipe was busting Stipe up. Both his eyes, his nose.

“He’s got a lot more power than he gets credit for. When he goes in against somebody, wrestling, the slam that he had on Dan Henderson … to do that to a guy like Dan Henderson? Holy (expletive). He’s just such a well-rounded, incredible human being.”

“People are going to criticize us no matter what we do,” White said. “But Brock came in, he popped for that thing, but he beat Mark Hunt, who’s one of the top guys, is a former world champion. And it’s a fight that people want to see. And it’s definitely a fight that Cormier wants. Cormier wants that fight. And I guarantee if Stipe won, he would have wanted that fight, too.”